(eastvalleytribune.com) NEW YORK - Curtis Sherrod knows there’s power in numbers. So when he decided to organize more than 100 rappers and poets in a 24-hour rap marathon where no cursing is allowed, he only saw the good that could come from it.
“There’s a feeling of fellowship and communal family spirit that’s generated when people are talking about positive things, about peace, about creativity,” says Sherrod, co-founder of the Global Artists Coalition (GAC), a New York nonprofit organization dedicated to career development for young people.
“It affects your mentality. Just in the same way if you heard (lyrics about) bang-bang shoot-shoot, for a couple of hours, you’d leave feeling a certain way. (The positive messages) have to affect you.”
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“We want to demonstrate that hip-hop can do something that’s positive in nature … without cursing, without foul language,” says Terry Nelson, the other founder of the GAC.
“It’s all about balance,” Sherrod adds. “People who want record deals will make records that will allow them to get a record deal. But you can’t use the rappers who choose to go that route as a blanket statement for all rappers. For every (gangsta rapper), there’s ten other rappers that are trying to do positive things.” (more…)
Related: The Global Artists Coalition
